


Not A Farewell

by bloodsongs



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Brief mentions of Gwen/Arthur, Did you want some tears with your bucketful of angst?, F/M, Gen, M/M, Post-Camlann, S5 Speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 17:50:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/600501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bloodsongs/pseuds/bloodsongs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>But no matter what happens, Merlin will never say goodbye.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not A Farewell

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this for Team Reincarnation on Tumblr at fuck 'o clock in the morning. I also have to wake up for work in about 4 hours with tear tracks drying on my face. Glorious! Who needs the apocalypse when you have soul-destroying Merlin season 5 feels?

Alone, he soldiers on.

Merlin sees the stones of the city in the reflections of rocks in rivers, thinks he hears the laughter and music of the lower town in the echoes of people from another village.

He sleeps on trees and dreams of seeing resplendent capes of Pendragon red billowing in the light, the clink of mail as the knights begin their training for the day.

When young girls smile sympathetically at this strange, scruffy man in a mockery of sorcerer’s robes and offer him bread, Merlin sees Gwen. He sees her happiness in the animated gestures of their hands, her unconditional love for her friends and her people in the way the girls’ eyes light up when he trades them small wooden carvings for their food. 

He wonders idly if she’s reunited with Lancelot now in the afterlife, how they would answer to each other with their own betrayals between them. Lancelot stepped gracefully aside for Arthur, but Gwen and Arthur have always known the moment she took his hand that Lancelot was always going to be between them, between the Once and Future King and his Queen. A part of Gwen who loved Lancelot fiercely from the start has never forgiven him for riding away, leaving her alone.

And then Arthur and Gwen had settled quietly into married life together all those years later; how things change. 

The nights are often cruel and cold. He keeps walking, because it’s the only thing he knows how to do now. Without a kingdom to be a Court Sorcerer for, no higher religion to serve, no intermittent destiny he has to answer to, Merlin is lost, desperately trying to find a purpose, a reason to keep on going.

Morgana haunts his hours between his restless sleep and waking. She taunts him, hurtful words from the past, hurtful words of what is to come. The blood and fire and brimstone that laces the edges of his nightmares never stop blazing, while Morgana laughs and laughs and laughs and the way Arthur falls to his knees is replayed in vivid detail over and over again.

(She cries, sometimes, calling him a traitor to his kind, his kin. Sometimes she tortures him, says that she could’ve loved him, that she could’ve loved Arthur, and Gwen, and everyone, if only they’d not abandoned her. You’re wrong, Merlin wants to tell her, you’re wrong, but then:

He wakes up. He always wakes up.)

His breath catches in his throat one time when he emerges from a forest, beautiful and green, to see a field full of golden wheat. It takes him by surprise, makes him want to choke up with the sheer force of emotion that overwhelms him, because  _Arthur_. The golden hues of the stalks sway lightly in the wind, and when Merlin blinks through the tears, he thinks he imagines Arthur standing there, royal and proud and insecure but every bit the king that would’ve changed everything.

Merlin believes there will never be any respite for him. The guilt will follow him the way the fall of Camelot haunts his every step; Merlin sees Arthur everywhere, sees his eyes in the blue skies, cloudy or clear. Hears Arthur’s chuckle and occasionally surprisingly inventive insults in the gurgle of a stream, or Arthur’s quiet footsteps in the rustling of dying autumn leaves. The shine off a lake reminds him of Excalibur one time, of the golden sword that would’ve united Albion at Arthur’s will, and Merlin just stops and sits by the lake to ponder the what ifs of their situation for the longest time.

Dead. They’re all dead.

Except for him.

A blessing and a curse. Why would he be allowed to live? Forced to live? He brought about the destruction of an entire kingdom, all but murdered everyone he’d ever loved. Perhaps that is why he stays, why he remains the only one to live out these painful, endless years. No amount of time will ever be enough for Merlin to atone for his sins.

Laughter bubbles in his throat. Destiny, the dragon said. He’s dead too, Kilgharrah; his time had come, just as he said it would. 

Merlin and Arthur had been two sides of a coin, once. Now he imagines he understands, because without Arthur — brilliant, beautiful, prattish Arthur — he feels hollow, and has been ever since Arthur crumpled on Mordred’s blade. The roaring in his ears has never stopped, not really, when he failed to make it to Arthur’s side in time with the fire burning everything down around them, when bodies littered the ground and dark magic hovered around them, sickly and ghoulish and wrong, wrong, wrong. 

He remembers Mordred cursing him one last time before he sent him to his death, before he fell to Arthur’s side, tears obscuring his visions. Arthur, noble king and eternal clotpole, had laughed at him, calling him sentimental and the best servant he could ever ask for, even if he was a lying liar who’d lied for years about his magic, and goodness, Merlin, you really can’t keep secrets, can you?

(Pendragon red mixing with the darker stain of copper-red blood; a sight he will never forget.)

“I won’t forget you,” Merlin had said, pressing his lips to Arthur’s clammy forehead, and then sweeping over Arthur’s lips.

Arthur smiled at him, fond, a little too knowing for his liking. Merlin’s heart had skipped at the thought of Arthur never really forgetting the indiscretions of their youth, when emotions were high and they’d fought and fucked in equal measure, but he doesn’t think Arthur has ever forgotten how much Merlin loved him. Loves him. Still does, even in death. “Keep me close.” He squeezed Merlin’s hand, weakly. “Keep me in your heart, your memories, for I will return.”

“Sire,” Merlin had managed.

“Maybe,” Arthur said. “Maybe next time, we’ll do it right. We’ll make things work. We won’t let the people down.” Another squeeze. “We won’t leave Morgana scared and alone. We wouldn’t have hurt Mordred. In another life, Gwen and Lancelot would’ve been happier.”

Merlin clutched at Arthur as though he was the one dying, clutched to him and wished desperately for all of this to be undone.

“Perhaps,” Arthur had said finally, eyes meeting Merlin’s, “I’ve always loved you.”

Few words, too little, too late.

Merlin shakes his head in remembrance. The sunset taunts him, gold bleeding into red into the darkness of the horizon beyond. He sighs and thumbs Arthur’s signet ring on his thumb, that gift bestowed upon him so long ago, and wishes. 

Wishes.

Always wishing.

Nothing ever happens.

Merlin imagines, when he looks out at the sky, that maybe those vibrant colours paint dragons unfurling their golden wings, mourning the end of an era.

The end of the Pendragons.

But no matter what happens, Merlin will never say goodbye.

(For he knows Arthur will one day return.)


End file.
